Lyons: "No free lunch," when it comes to energy.

In a speech at the Western Energy Summit last month, NRC Commissioner Pete Lyons delivered the message that there's no free lunch when it comes to generating energy:

To sustain your population and economic growth into the future, your choices for new energy sources are going to be increasingly confined to those three sustainable (coal, renewables, nuclear energy) sources. And – to remind you of the title of my talk – there simply is “no free lunch” as you make those choices. You’ll be faced with the reality that every source of energy brings with it a set of costs or risks as well as benefits that have to be carefully weighed.

That's something folks in Scotland are discovering, as Greenpeace has decided to oppose the construction of what would be the world's largest wind farm on an island off the Scottish coast.

That's bad news, as worldwide energy demand isn't going to slacken. In the end, we're going to need every possible source of energy -- including clean coal, renewables and nuclear energy -- if we're going to meet future demand.

Technorati tags: Environment, Energy, Politics, Technology, Economics

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